READING – A few nights ago, I heard a crash on the front porch and flicked on the light to reveal a black bear’s reflective eyes. It lorded over the contents spilling out of our overturned floor freezer. I opened the door, prompting it to tear back through the screen[Read More…]

READING – Twenty years ago, at this time of year, I found myself walking the margin of a marsh in east-central Vermont with Bob Popp, Vermont’s state botanist at that time. We had traveled to that particular site because it showed promise as potential habitat for the rare northeastern bulrush.[Read More…]

READING – Fractals are sometimes referred to as a “visual representation of math.” They can be observed in the spatial arrangements found in many familiar forms, patterns, and shapes in nature: from the branching of trees, ferns, river systems, and lightning, to the patterns found in leaves, seedheads, crystals, seashells,[Read More…]

READING – While many are still basking in the afterglow of the total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024, a lunar eclipse is about to have its day in the sun. In the early hours of March 14, a total lunar eclipse will be visible across North America. The entire[Read More…]

READING – The Northeast is famous for its fall foliage, as the lush, green leaves of summer transform into bright hues, turning hillsides and valleys into quilts of scarlet, ochre, and gold. Among the brightest foliage is that of our region’s various maple species. But as our summers have become,[Read More…]

READING – Birds exist in a fluid and unpredictable world. Survival depends on remaining constantly alert, adapting and responding to encounters with predators and environmental conditions that change with the seasons, weather, and geography. But sleep is also essential, providing rest, rejuvenation, and healing. Normally, day-active (diurnal) animals sleep at[Read More…]

READING – If you wanted to see the Sunapee trout, you might be inclined to search in its namesake, New Hampshire’s Lake Sunapee. But this elusive fish has long been extirpated from the Granite State, and from neighboring Vermont, where it once lived in the Northeast Kingdom’s Averill Lakes. Sunapee[Read More…]

READING – July 2023 was the hottest month ever recorded worldwide, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Rising temperatures associated with climate change have dramatically increased atmospheric moisture, causing more frequent and severe storms. During the Great Vermont Flood of July 10-11, 2023, at peak flow more than[Read More…]

READING – In the cosmic dance of heavenly bodies, no phenomenon possesses the drama of a solar eclipse, when the moon passes directly between the sun and earth. In the path of totality, where the moon completely obscures our home star, the world falls into an ominous darkness that has[Read More…]

READING – Boiling maple sap into syrup is a time honored tradition in the Northeast, to the olfactory delight of anyone who has spent time in a steamy sugarhouse while inhaling the sweet maple scent of the season. It used to be that trees were tapped in late March, and[Read More…]

READING – When it comes to winter in the North Country, brown is not beautiful. Climate change has brought sudden and extreme fluctuations in weather along with a dramatic decline in the amount of snowfall that blankets the ground. This is especially marked in the Northeast, where winter is warming[Read More…]